


Remembrance

by AntsySerpentine



Category: Halo (Video Games) & Related Fandoms
Genre: Angst, Grief/Mourning, Halo Reach, Other, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Reach
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-21
Updated: 2020-08-21
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:02:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26032342
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AntsySerpentine/pseuds/AntsySerpentine
Summary: After surviving the Fall of Reach and being a witness to the deaths of Noble Team, Talia-B271 must continue to carry on without them. They may have died on Reach, but they will never die in her memory.
Relationships: Noble Six | Emile-A239/ Noble Four, Talia/Emile-A239, mentions of Talia/Emile-A239
Comments: 1
Kudos: 7





	Remembrance

It wasn’t a vision Talia would easily forget, nor a nightmare that could be easily escaped.

Since the events that took place on Reach, the same scenes continued to play in her head every time she attempted to sleep. 

It had been three days since she last got a wink of rest, pushing through the day with extra strong coffee and continual training. Anything to get the thoughts out of her head, anything to take her mind off of—

It’s been a month since Reach fell. A month since she lost her entire team. 

Her stomach twisted at the mere scent of tea as she entered the mess hall. Lavender: it was one that Jorge particularly enjoyed. 

Talia’s mind wandered back to when she had first interacted with Noble Team. When she had first been switched in to fill in as a little extra muscle.

Jorge had offered her a cup of lavender tea that morning. He had noticed that the new addition to the team was skittish, she was on guard and frigid.

The cup of tea he had prepared for her was in hopes that she would feel a bit more relaxed and unwind. While she never did relax completely, Jorge helped her to feel more welcome to the team. It’s not something she would ever forget.

Her mind reverted back to when the old bear had lifted her by the chest plate, as she desperately was trying to writhe from his grip, but her body was unwilling to cooperate. 

She remembered the hidden sorrow in Jorge’s eyes from the moment he let her go from the Covenant cruiser.

A scream of despair lodged in her throat as she fell down, down, down, down . . . .

Talia could feel the stares of other soldiers upon her as she slowly started to ground herself back to the present. For a moment, she was confused, perplexed, unsure of where she was at this specific point in time.

Her gaze shifted around, noting that she was indeed in the mess hall. Talia turned her attention towards a clock several meters away from her. The time read 12:38 pm. 

_ 'What day is it? What month is it? What year is it?' _

They were questions she thought she knew the answer to, questions that should have been very obvious and very clear to her.

The shock of it still had yet to completely wear off. She felt like she had just been battered against the surface of the planet when the images of the memory faded away. 

Talia felt like she was getting strangled by her own grief. She forced herself to swallow it back down, taking a long sip of coffee in an attempt to wash it away. It didn’t make the feeling go away entirely, but she no longer felt like she had anything stuck in her throat

It was September 29th, 2552. 

That’s right. She’d been ordered a mandatory rest period, likely due to the condition in which she escaped from the planet. The Spartan was no longer sore, all her wounds on the surface had healed, leaving behind scattered scars and marred patches of skin.

She survived, but she knew she shouldn’t even be alive right now. A churning feeling in her gut alerted her that she hadn’t eaten yet, but the idea of food was too offputting to even consider it.

_ ‘I’ll just eat later.’ _

It was a lie, and she knew it. Talia turned sharply on her heel to exit the mess hall. There were too many faces, too many eyes and ears around for her to feel even remotely comfortable. Why did she even go there in the first place?

An old habit, really. She had grown so accustomed to joining the rest of the team in the morning that it was still a slap to the face when she entered and realized none of them were there. 

_ It was just her.  _

_ Alone. _

_ The Lone Wolf. _

_ The Black Widow. _

Twice, she lost all the people that meant more than the universe to her.

Twice, she watched as the Covenant took away her family, the people she loved.

Twice, she’s been devastated by the result of such destruction and bloodshed.

The first time around, she wasn’t but just a girl. Just a child. Helpless and completely devoid of any sort of power whatsoever.

But this time? She had strength, she had power, she had combat experience, she had enough killings under her belt to be bestowed the title of ‘hyper-lethal’. She had a life’s worth of training and preparation to meet such an enemy head-on.

_ It wasn’t enough to protect Reach. It wasn’t enough to keep her team alive. _

_ ‘Tell them to make it count.’ _

The Spartan had carried herself away from the mess hall, now wandering almost aimlessly throughout the outpost, coffee mug in hand. Her mind felt clouded, she was distracted, thoughts swimming around in her head as she carried on.

She wasn’t present. Talia was trapped in her own headspace, and if she wasn’t aware of it herself, the soldiers that passed her knew. The thousand-yard stare never lied; Talia’s looked as though she were a million of them away.

But did she make it count? She did her damndest to fend off the Covenant forces, and even as she cut them down one by one, it was as though she couldn’t even get more than a small dent into them. 

Despite that, her actions allowed Reach to have enough time to evacuate civilians from the planet, as many as she could have escape successfully. She personally delivered what was referred to as ‘humanity’s final chance’, their own secret weapon against the Covenant, as Dr. Halsey had put it.

She held to stave off the invasion for long enough to allow Humanity to get the extra edge that they needed to win. 

Though the war was still ongoing. Soldiers kept dying in the thousands, and the number of Spartans was dwindling to a low count. So many MIA statuses. Too many MIA statuses.

Talia survived to help Humanity fight another day, though the end of the war was far out of her sight, at least how she saw things.

However, the victory for the UNSC with Operation: FIRST STRIKE was the first time, perhaps in the longest time that she’s felt any semblance of hope. The first time that perhaps maybe, just maybe that the war would turn in their favor.

She didn’t want to get too optimistic. It could have been a fluke, and getting too over their heads with it would surely be the end of Humanity if things go south again.

The Spartan found herself back near the mess hall once more when she managed to touch back to base with reality. The smell of lavender was faint, now, bittersweet.

Jorge returned to her thoughts once more. She thought about how thrilled he would be with the news of such a victory. She knew how happy it probably would have made him too know that not all was lost. That no matter what the odds were, Humanity was far too stubborn to let it kill them.

Talia made her way over towards where the tea packets were, picking up two bags of lavender tea and holding them between her fingers while she refilled her empty mug with hot water. The Spartan tore the bags free, placing them into the water while tying the strings to each other and around the handle of her mug.

Lavender. It was one of Jorge’s favorites, and it was the first cup of tea that she ever received from him. It only felt right to have some of it now.

_ ‘We’ve made it count, Jorge. We’re finally striking back.’ _


End file.
